


Avenging Angel

by R00bs_Teacup



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Magic-Users
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-03
Updated: 2015-09-03
Packaged: 2018-04-18 19:57:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4718606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/R00bs_Teacup/pseuds/R00bs_Teacup
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Morgause is dead. What is Morgana meant to do now? The world has cast them out, there's nothing left. Morgana decides to take everything from the world in return. How will it play out? How might it play out? Is it anger or forgiveness, peace or violence, that is the answer?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Avenging Angel

**Author's Note:**

> This is an experiment of what might be.  
> for WARNINGS see end note

“I loved my sister, and I lost my sister. That is all I'm here to say today. I spoke these words to an empty church this morning, and now I speak them before a crowd. You have gathered, like vultures, to pick over the dead and take what parts you wish for yourselves, leaving the rest to rot. There wasn't much left of Morgause even before she died. She was beaten, she was abused, she was outcast and rejected and told no a thousand times a thousand different ways, and still you know her only as the woman who fought you. She fought you, every day, with everything, because she wanted the world to be a better place. In the end, that's all there is. She fought for a better world, and she fought for me, and she was my sister. I loved her. I lost her.”

Morgana steps down off the stage to shouts and boos and flashes of cameras. She will not be answering questions. She has answered their questions, Morgause has answered their questions. That is in the past. Now, for Morgana, there is only grief. She sees Gwen in the crowd, and Gwen meets her eyes and is sad and hurt, and Morgana doesn't care, because Gwen isn't going to support her and has not supported her for a long time now. 

As Morgana walks down the steps, away from the graveyard, leaving Morgause, she passes Arthur, too. Arthur isn't like Gwen. He has his chin raised and he doesn't meet her eyes. Morgana doesn't mind Arthur hating her so much as she minds Gwen. Maybe it's because Arthur never truly hates her. Once Arthur loves you, he loves you for ever, no matter what you do. Morgana is aware that she did not act in Arthur's best interest. He was on the wrong side, and she had undermined him. She's doesn't regret it, and she still believes it was right to do it, but she understands better why he isn't happy with her. 

“I'm sorry,” Arthur says, as she passes, “I am so very sorry.”

Morgana leaves him, too. Because he isn't going to change, he is too stubborn. And while he pointed out that they fight for the same things, they have never agreed on method and they have never agreed on how far to go and he was on the wrong side for too long for her to grant forgiveness. They are both stubborn. 

Merlin's going to be there, somewhere. Merlin, who should be standing with her, who should have stood with Morgause, but loved Arthur too much. She hates Merlin worst of all. The creeping, eating hate that curdles and burns her inside out. The anger he sparks laying waste to her. The fear he creates in her causing her to shrivel. 

There was not much left of Morgause, and there isn't much left of Morgana. She walks head held high, though, and she pushes through the crowd. She is a radical, a revolutionary. She will let her anger out and burn and pillage and destroy, hurt everyone who has created this society which leaves magic in the cold, which leaves her in the cold, which hurts and hurts and hurts, and takes and takes and takes. There has been no respite, and the world will have no respite in return. 

She will burn it down around her. She doesn't care. 

**

“Why should I stop, Arthur? Why?” Morgana asks. 

He's been hunting her for years, dogging her heels, trying to hobble her. He has succeeded, now and then. He has won a battle. The war is hers, though, and will always be. She pulls her magic out of the air around her with a word and flings the blade at Arthur again, embedding it in his thigh. They're in the middle of the British Museum, the place shattered to tunnels of rock and statue and exhibit around them. Nothing but carnage. 

“I thought we were friends,” Arthur says, all the fight gone out of him, “what happened to you?”

“They took everything, and then they kept taking. They pierced me until there was nothing but hole left, and then kept on shooting arrows. They caused pain and suffering to everyone I loved, everyone I cared for. I have no one left to lose. No one but you. And what are you?”

“I'm your brother, your friend, I love you.”

“Where were you, then? Where were you when Uther told me I was a freak? When the kids at school beat me so badly I had to be hospitalized, and Uther told me it was my fault for parading my freak-nature? Where were you when he threw me out of my home? When I had nowhere to go and nothing to eat, nothing but the streets? Where were you when I was bullied and hurt and trodden down and given nothing?”

“I was fighting him.”

“You were not! You liar! You were nothing but a coward when he was alive and you're nothing but a coward now he's dead. You have done nothing to fight, nothing to help!”

“I have done nothing violent,” Arthur says. 

Morgana laughs derisively and conjures the images, the memories, of protests and sit ins, of police violence, of arrests and rapes. Arthur backing down and everyone else suffering, everyone else hurting. 

“You're a man, and you have no magic,” Morgana spits, “you do not decide how we fight. You do not give us up for some utopian ideal of peace. You should have been a shield, you should have stood in front of us. You are a coward.”

Merlin is here. Of course he is. Where Arthur is, Merlin follows. Morgana throws Merlin into the wall and Arthur crawls over, bleeding, to hold his broken toy. Morgana watches them, twisting the blades still in Arthur's flesh with her fingers, turning, twisting, winding. 

“Stop,” Merlin whispers.

Morgana lets go the blades and plays with Merlin's broken body, instead. The bones she shattered grate when she shifts them. Merlin screams. 

“Please,” Arthur says, looking at her and begging.

He's never begged before. It is new.

“He's not,” Merlin whispers, weak with pain, dying, “not what you believe.”

Merlin conjures his own pictures. Watery, wavering things. Arthur and Uther shouting at one another, Arthur walking miles and miles in the rain, looking for her. Arthur on the streets, with her photo, searching. Searching for years. Morgana hadn't known, hadn't seen that. It's too late, though, and far, far too little. She breaks that picture with her own, with herself being dragged away and locked in chains, Aithusa curled and locked and broken too. 

“God,” Arthur whispers.

“There is no God,” Morgana tells him. 

Merlin waves his hand and the air buzzes gold, vibrating with energy. 

“He makes me feel like this,” Merlin says, with his last breaths. 

And the picture in the gold is Arthur, arms crossed over his chest like a stone knight in a cathedral, eyes closed. He's stood in front of the police. 

“It wasn't enough,” Morgana says, helplessly, “you cannot fight the systematic violence we face every day like that. Life and death, Arthur. And it's more often death. We die, we don't get to live. No freedom, no fresh air, no love. Just despair and death. And pain, so much pain.”

“I am only one man,” Arthur says. 

“You are one man who props up the oppression with your weak compliance! You hunt me down and cripple me!”

“You are causing pain. To everyone.”

“There is no one who doesn't deserve it.”

Morgana twists the blade closer and closer to Arthur's heart, worming slowly through his flesh. She's about to finish it when a blade that is not hers to control pierces her back. Punctures her. Her head falls back and she sees him. 

“Mordred,” she says, unable to believe it.

**

“I can help you,” Morgana tells Mordred, when she finds him. 

He's lost again, and has wandered to her. She will protect him, help him. Save him.

“It's too much,” Mordred says. 

“Too much? Who is going to change anything?”

“They cannot change what you destroy. They cannot change to something that is so fear-driven.”

“I'm not afraid.”

“You create fear, though. Nothing but fear. Nothing can be built out of fear, nothing good.”

“I do not want to build, I want to destroy.”

Mordred lowers his head. Morgana can feel the anger burning in him. There are many it burns. Many for whom there is no escape, no out except this horror. She knows it is horror, she is lying- she is afraid. She is so very afraid. But there is no other answer. She won't be arrested for walking down the street. She won't be herded into a ghetto and rousted every day and every night by the police. She won't live in the dirt and poverty they allow her. 

All Morgana wants is a home, somewhere to call her own. The freedom to be. To grow things, to love. She wants to have books, shelves, a dog. To live by the sea. She wants her people to be able to have those things, to be able to work for those things. She wants, so badly, to rest. But she cannot. She will not give up the fight. 

“I will not walk in the light and forget the dark,” Morgana tells Mordred, taking his hands, “and I will not be forced back to the darkness. There is nothing for me, not in the world as it stands. There is nothing. How is that fair?”

“It isn't.”

“Then walk with me. Make the light. We may not be allowed to bath in it, but we will walk and leave it blazing behind us. We won't leave our people to scrabble, blind, helpless. I won't.”

“I won't.”

Morgana bows her head and their foreheads meet, and she has someone. For the first time since Morgause, she has someone. For the second time in her life, she has someone. They will walk together. 

**

They shatter the police barricade, it doesn't take much. Mordred walks through the gathered men in blue and draws the life force from them. This isn't a revolution, this is retribution. 

“You will not hurt us any more,” Morgana tells the police officers, “we will not be hurt.”

**

“No more!” She yells from the buildings she's destroyed, “There will be no more!”

**

Merlin thinks he's won, but Morgana is going to kill him. He took Mordred, so Morgana is going to take his life. In return. Arthur is already dead, Morgana knows the way Mordred fights. Arthur might be breathing, but he's already dead. They aren't hard to find. 

“Merlin,” Morgana hisses, “Emrys.”

“Yes,” Merlin says, simply, “I am Emrys. And this is finished. No more, Morgana.”

It's surprisingly easy to die at Merlin's hand. She doesn't want to, but in the end he gives her no choice. She knows why they call him Emrys, after that. As she dies, she finally understands why they fear and worship him. He just takes away her choice to live or die, and she dies. Arthur crouches and gathers her into his arms. 

“I love you,” he says, “I love you.”

“I hate you,” Morgana tells him, “you took it all, and I hate you.”

“I know,” Arthur says simply. 

He's dying, too. He refuses to go with Merlin, he sits with her, cradling her, crying. He tells her about Gwen, about loving her. Morgana looks to Merlin and sees only pain. She smiles. After all of that, all the things Merlin did and gave up for Arthur, and Arthur only loves Gwen. That is pleasing.

They die together.

**

“I am here for my sister,” Morgana tells the crowd, “I loved her and she died. There's nothing else.”

She walks, head held high, down the church steps. She refuses to meet Gwen's eyes. She sees Arthur, and Arthur sees her, and his eyes she does meet. He's standing with Gwaine, and Morgana knows there's no forgiveness for the things she's done to Gwaine. She passes Arthur by. 

**

“I lost my sister, I loved her,” Morgana says, and walks into the crowd. 

She doesn't see anyone, can't see anything beyond her grief. She trips, someone trips her, and there's a camera in her face, an angry question, an accusation, an accusation against Morgause, and she can't get out. She's crying, her head is sinking to her chest, and she's crying. 

“Morgana.”

It's Gwen, and Arthur's with her. Arthur's drawing Morgana through the crowd, pushing, strong shoulders and the promise of violence that's always carefully trapped inside him clearing a path. She goes with him until she's free, then pulls away. 

**

“I love Morgause, and you're all vultures!” Morgana shouts into the crowd, no control, only anger and grief. 

Arthur's standing with Gwaine, holding Gwaine's elbow. There's no forgiveness there. Morgana tries to walk by, not look, but Arthur's meeting her eyes and she stops, by accident.

“I'm sorry, Mo'aan,” Arthur says, the old nickname tripping off his tongue with ease, the old word for love buried within him, buried by Ygraine, deeper than Uther could ever reach. 

Morgana stops still and meets his eyes. They stare at one another, and she remembers being small and clinging to his hand as they walk along the sea shore. 

“It's too late,” Morgana snaps and tries to turn, but Arthur's holding her. 

“Not for you and I. You've got nothing,” Arthur says, and there's heat and anger there that she hadn't expected, “there's no one in the world who'll forgive you what you've done, there's no forgiveness to find. Except here, with me.”

Morgana pulls away and leaves him. 

**

“Morgause,” Morgana says, “fought. And I will fight. To the death, if necessary.”

She walks past Gwen, who's crying and holding onto Merlin, past Gwaine, cradled against Lancelot's strong body, past Leon, who averts his gaze but holds his strong stance. Arthur stands in her path. 

“I'll not offer forgiveness,” Arthur says, “not for you, and not for her.”

“We do not ask it of you. You're nothing.”

“Perhaps. The tide is turning, Morgana. You may have turned it. I'm not offering forgiveness, merely advice. Sit back and watch. Wait.”

Morgana refuses. 

**

“Morgause was my only support,” Morgana says, “and she was the only support of most you out there in the crowd! Our methods were extreme, but how do you fight when you have nothing and the people you are fighting have everything? You fight dirty and you fight mean and you fight however you can! I will not apologise!”

“And you won't be forgiven!” Someone yells. 

Morgana walks through the crowd, which parts for her only so it can spit and throw things. Arthur stands by the gate and opens it for her. 

“I may forgive,” he says, “I may find it in me. If you stop fighting that way.”

“Never.”

Morgana pauses, though, to see what Arthur's next step will be. She watches from afar as he capitalises on Morgause's death. The anger of that blinds her, and she turns to destruction and burning and pain.

**

“I love her. She can't be dead,” Morgana says, stumbling out of the church, talking to no one but the sky.

The cameras and mics are a surprise, but she uses it. They don't hear her mumbled terror, so she changes her carriage from bumbling fear to defiance and speaks and spits with anger. Then she sweeps down the steps. Arthur's stood just beyond the crowd, Gwaine holding his shoulder, Merlin somewhere. Always close. 

“What?” Morgana asks.

“We're going to use Morgause's death to end your movement and begin a more peaceful one,” Arthur says, “we will fight.”

“I won't, not with you, not like that.”

Gwaine grins, sharp and unexpected, no joy. 

“Then fight your way, but fight for us, eh?”

“I won't fight for Arthur's pathetic, neutered idiocy,” Morgana spits, seething.

“Not for him. For us. Fight for the people you hurt. Because we're the ones you were supposed to bloody protect,” Gwaine says. 

His voice is wrecked. She did that. His eyes are tempests, but cannot see. She did that, too. He clings to Arthur, and she did that. She smiles to see her destruction, to see what she is capable of.

“Fight for us, or for them, or for whoever” Arthur says, “violence is not, can not, be our way. But we will back an avenging knight.”

Morgana will not work for them. She refuses, rejects him and Gwaine and Merlin and their attempts. She does fight for something different, though. Not herself and not Morgause, and certainly not Gwaine. But perhaps for Mordred, caught up with them and who knew where, possibly dead. Perhaps for Sefa, who died not at Morgana's hand, but at Morgause's behest. Perhaps for poor, stupid Tyr, who was Morgana's. She fights for those Morgause and she hurt, and for those Arthur hurt, for those Merlin failed to protect, for those Uther burned. 

She is so angry. She dismantles huge pieces of society around her. She destroys and causes pain, and everywhere she's been Arthur walks in her wake and builds and reunites and heals. He is a leader, bringing unity, the promise of peace. And behind Arthur walks Gwen, tender hearted and warm. Arthur builds and Gwen rekindles hope and love and good things. She is a healer, more than Morgana or Merlin, or Morgause, more than any of them ever were. 

Morgana goes on before, her fire and anger laying waste. Merlin moves between her and Arthur, Arthur and Gwen, defending and creating and causing and chasing. His power is such that it is beyond the world, beyond their war, beyond everything. He knits the chasms in the earth itself, he uses the energy from the core of the earth and soothes the places her burnings scar. He stands behind Arthur and amplifies, glorifies, extends. He stands next to Gwen and fights for her. 

Gwaine walks with Arthur, padding like a dog at his side. Or perhaps a wolf. An old wolf, worn from battle, but still dangerous. Perhaps most dangerous of them all, for Gwaine will fight until there's nothing left. Gwaine is loyal beyond probability, and he will pad alongside Arthur until there's no breath left within his body. Gwaine walks beside Arthur, but he walks for Merlin. He loves Merlin. 

They all do, and Merlin loves Arthur. They learn, one by one, to love Arthur, but it's Merlin who they walk for, who they stand for, who they speak and live for. Arthur loves Merlin, but it is to Gwen he pledges his heart and it is with Gwen he ends with, always. Every steps is towards her, even as he leads her. Every time her reaches for her she's there, and every time she calls for him he appears. It is Gwen who Arthur's heart beats for. 

And Morgana loves no one and fights for no one and walks at no one's side. She has no one to be loyal to. There is no one left, nothing left. She is burnt out, nothing inside her but instinct. Morgana fights for justice, now, instead of for revenge. It is for justice she burns and it is justice she will meet out, coldly, calculatingly, fairly. There is nothing merciful about justice, nothing merciful about fair. And she is perfect for the job; she gave up mercy long ago. 

Morgana dies the day the world finds a kind of equilibrium. The law-makers lay down arms and beg for peace, beg for Arthur to make terms, any terms. The government folds and the Houses of Power break. Morgana dies, ahead, at the front of the battle column. She dies in the dust and lies there. It is Gwen who finds her, who holds her, who whispers forgiveness Morgana didn't know she needed. Whispers Arthur's forgiveness and love as well as Gwen's own. It is Gwen who takes her up and walks onwards, bearing Morgana. 

“I loved her,” Gwen tells the gathered crowd, “She made mistakes, but so does everyone. Morgana's were made out of love, and so we forgive. We all loved her, at one point or another. I loved Morgana, and now she's gone. The law is changing, the world is changing. We do not go believing that this is the end, that revolution and fight will never be needed again. But we have won this war, and the next will be for younger hearts to lead. We were lead by Morgana, though there were many we followed. Morgana was our head, our warrior, our defender. I loved Morgana, and now Morgana is gone.”

**Author's Note:**

> Magic users are an oppressed people and Morgana talks about some of the atrocitites they have suffered- rape, homelessnesss, bigotry, violence, death.


End file.
